


Blissful Ignorance

by Antares10



Series: Amnesia Falls [1]
Category: Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Gravity Falls
Genre: Amnesia, Amnesia Crossover, Angst, Bill Chiper being a dick, Dark, Disturbing Themes, Ford being creepy and fits way to much into an Amnesia universe, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Insanity, Journal, Just... think Gravity Falls but in an Amnesia context, Kinda AU, Kinda Dipper/Ford, Non-Graphic Violence, Notebook, Other, Physical Trauma, Poor Dipper, Protective Stan Pines, Weirdmageddon ended differently, dark themes, it's gonna be dark, mental trauma, not a happy fic, nothing is really graphic but dark stuff is in it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-17
Updated: 2020-02-17
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:40:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22774291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Antares10/pseuds/Antares10
Summary: Weirdmageddon ended a bit differently and Ford and Stan were never forced to make up before Bill was defeated. Now there are still leftovers of weirdness in the world and somebody's gotta clean them up. So a very disgruntled Ford, a curious Dipper, an excited Mabel and a doubtful Stan make their way to a mansion said to be haunted by the past to find and get rid of any leftovers from the late dream demon.Something goes very very very wrong.A Gravity Falls x Amnesia AU
Relationships: Bill Cipher & Dipper Pines, Bill Cipher/Ford Pines, Dipper Pines & Ford Pines, Stanley Pines & Stanford Pines
Series: Amnesia Falls [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1797148
Comments: 5
Kudos: 19





	Blissful Ignorance

**Author's Note:**

> For my fantastic friends who enable me waaaaaay to much. XD Also for Pandir especially who was the best beta ever again.

When he woke up, he was alone. Alone, laying on cold, hard ground and having the headache of the millennium.

Also, he couldn't recall a thing that happened. Or who he was. Or where he was.

There... were a lot of things missing apparently. Pretty much everything.

Amnesia, whispered a voice in the back of his mind. Most likely as a result of a harrowing event. Retrograde amnesia, the loss of all memories before the event and of the event itself.

Alright, he had a name for it now. Didn't mean it helped him a lot. So he supposed he should look around, find clues.

He sat up, rubbed his head. There was no bump on his skull, no blood when his hand came away from his hair. So, no head-trauma. Lucky.

His vision seemed a bit... obstructed. He felt around his eyes and noticed that he was wearing glasses.

Also, his glasses were dirty. Grime and smeared water and a small crack at the edge. Yuck. He cleaned his glasses with a tissue he found in his pockets. Well at least that improved his ability to see clearly, so he was able to look around the room a bit better.

There wasn’t anything familiar about the room, unfortunately.

It looked like a study of sort. The only light was coming from a few lit candles and a small lantern in the corner. The windows were decorated with plain curtains and outside it was dark, though the silhouettes of trees could be seen, pine trees mostly, standing close together and obscuring the view.

He looked around the room. There was not that much here, a desk and some bookshelves, a nice-looking chair, a lamp and some small knickknacks like a bunch of magazines (Fully clothed ladies? Gold chains for men? Did he really read that?), a picture of two kids that looked vaguely familiar, a pick-pocketing-set, some clothes and finally, among the clutter, was a book that looked like a simple notebook.

It was blue and rather small and the writing inside was kind of messy but readable. Apparently, the little notebook was in fact a journal and the writer called himself Stanley Pines.

Something about the name seemed almost right. Not quite, but the closest to a “yes” feeling he had since waking up. This journal was familiar to him, and he could almost hear whispers in the darkness around him.

“ _A notebook? Wait, is this your diary?”_

“ _It's not a diary! It's a journal!”_

“ _Okay, okay... YOU keep a journal?”_

“ _What can I say, this old bowl of marbles is not what it used to be. I write things down to not forget something important. Also, while writing I can swear all I want and the kids will be none the wiser.”_

“ _Until they find it.”_

“ _Pffft, they won't. I always keep it on my person.”_

“ _Well, if you are so sure about this, Stan...”_

Stan... yeah that sounded right. At least better than Stanley. Maybe he went by Stan usually? He must have a very strong opinion about his name. Something in the pit of his stomach was hot and heavy like molten lead when he rolled the name around on his tongue.

The other voice he remembered sounded close to his own... it was strange, he KNEW that voice. Somebody he knew well. Somebody he allowed himself to have some easy banter with.

He... Stan... Stan looked at the journal in his hands. Yeah, no point in just staring at it, if he wanted to have any information, he had to read it.

So he started reading the book, trying to find out more about himself.

The first few entries were strange and sounded like insignificant rambling most of the time (something about gnomes and suckers and how he should remember not to use wood glue on feathers again) and some pages looked like he had been using them to solve some higher math problems. Some pages were different, talking about some problem he was trying to solve but wasn't able to. Some kind of project he was working on, something that went wrong time and time again. Something he was trying to fix but couldn't, couldn't, couldn't.

Then there were entries about the kids. Stan's eyes trailed back to the photograph he had seen earlier. Two kids, a boy and a girl, who were grinning at the camera.

_Twins. Of course they are twins. Pines twins. Of course._

_One of them almost died. But he came through. Mabel punched the doctor when she came out._

_I will literally kill for these kids. But they really shouldn't have much to do with me. They deserve the best._

Twins. Something about that stirred some sort of emotion inside him, something warm and fuzzy. Twins were important. And the way Stan had written about them in his journal, it had been just as important to him as Stan now felt it should be.

But he didn't write why. Well, that made sense. He probably had thought he wouldn't NEED to write it down.

_The kids are coming for the summer. What were they thinking? Giving me the kids?_

_I guess I can make them work in the shop? Kids like mysteries, right? The fresh air should tire them out enough, so they sleep at night... I just have to make sure they stay away from the weirdness here._

That sounded sensible. Whatever was going on, it was obviously either important or dangerous or both. Not the best environment for children, surely.

_Damn Gnomes. Stupid little men always trying to steal my stuff._

_They get along so well. Heh, almost unnaturally well. And they are so much alike... well, me and my bro._

_A bit._

_Dipper is a know-it-all and has his nose in a book all the time. Bored out of his skull around here... and hides his birthmark. Mabel is a free spirit. Mom would have liked her. Always full of energy and creative. She’s got fight in her._

Stan started to go over some of the entries faster. Entries about the kids, adventures in a place called Gravity Falls. The name made something in Stan's chest tingle. The kids had to mean a lot to him. The world as it seemed. Dipper and Mabel, two that were his. His family. His most precious.

More entries talking about something he was about to fix. And finally, one entry that talked about success. Success and then bitterness. A brother that was not like he thought he would be.

_He’s back. He is finally back. And after everything I have done to get him back? 30 years. 30 years of my life and the last thing I heard him ever say to me was to do something, to help him. And he came back just to tell me off and punch me in the face and now he wants his “house and life back”? What life? What house? First, he lets me get thrown on the streets while he is living the life with his fancy school and grand house in the woods. Then he gets me to be his errant boy. And now after doing what he wanted he is STILL pushing me away?_

_This ungrateful bastard._

_After this summer, after the kids are gone, I'll be gone too._

There were some words scribbled out and whole sentences crossed out with such force that the paper had been torn slightly. Still, Stan remembered nothing, yet there was strong feeling resonating within him when he read the words.

Betrayal.

He could feel the white-hot rage inside him. He had been betrayed.

He still felt it. Even if he couldn't remember.

He read more. Some pages were apparently missing from the journal. Ripped out. Actually, at closer inspection, a lot of pages were missing. One of the pages left seemed to be newer, closer to the current date.

_So my brother got all excited about this old mansion. The Northwest Mansion. Creepy and spooky stuff you know? I don't like that creepy old thing and I don't like my brother and the kids even near it, but the kids wanted an adventure and well... who am I to keep these two from having some fun? Dipper especially was so excited, talking about harassing some ghost? I really hope I don't have to give him the consent talk about ghosts of all things. He begged me to allow him to go with my brother and then of course, Mabel wanted to tag along. I guess I can't keep them from this and well, at least I can keep an eye on them when I'm with them._

_I don’t care much for this old house. Apparently, some weird stuff happened there? Mice and frustrated staff I tell you, but my brother insists that some spookum is causing all the ruckus._

So this had to be where he was - he was here in this mansion for some... weird, creepy... something. With his brother and the kids he loved very much. The brother that had betrayed him but they... might be getting along now, judging from this journal entry? Hopefully.

But something was wrong. Something had gone wrong. His memories were gone and his brother and the kids were gone.

There were more pages missing, torn out. The last one had just one entry, written fast and messily.

_Something bad is going on down there. Something with my brother. Dipper is down there in the basement with him for days now. Enough is enough. If he doesn't come upstairs today, I'll go down there and give him a piece of my mind._

Stan closed the journal and put it into his jacket. Maybe he would find some of the ripped-out pages, he hoped. The journal also had given him a good hint on what to do now.

Go down. Down to the basement.

Dipper was there and his brother and probably Mabel too and something happened. Probably he had already ventured downstairs... and something had happened and had made him forget and wake up here again.

Stan really wished he could remember.

Finally, he stood up and got a small lantern and left the room.

His first task was to find the basement. His brother and Dipper were obviously there, so he had to find them. The problem was the size of the mansion.

And the actual layout of it.

Stan frowned at the third saloon he passed by, looking just like the other two he came across by opening random doors. All rooms were big, high ceilings and high windows. It was dark outside, probably nighttime, but his lantern provided just enough light to look around. Wood everywhere, expensive looking carvings and golden details, precious looking pictures on the walls, tapestries on the ground or on the walls too, next to mounted animal heads. Some pictures in silver frames. Expensive looking furniture, chairs and tables and bookcases filled with old looking tomes that were probably worth a fortune or nothing at all.

It was excess, the kind of tasteless too-much that only the rich that were past the need for practicality could want for. Stan hated it.

Also most of these rooms seemed... dead. A fine layer of dust was on almost every surface. The windows were looking dirty. Here and there he could see a spider spinning a web between the antlers of a mounted deer head or across some chairs.

“Good luck finding any food here, you foolish creature.” mumbled Stan to one of the spiders.

This whole mansion was creeping him out. He left the saloon behind and tried another door.

It was locked.

  
“Damnit.”

But there was a slight draft coming from it, indicating that this was most likely the door he was searching for.

So what he needed was a key.

If this door was locked and his brother and Dipper were down there... then somebody had to have locked it. All the more reason to get through it.

Stan contemplated what to do. He could try and force the door open, but it was massive oak wood and the hinges and the lock looked quite solid. Or he could try and search some more for a spare key. These old houses never had just ONE key for anything, right?

So, where would a key like this be? Who would even NEED a key in a house like this?

“The servants.” whispered Stan. Of course. Servants needed their own keys for everything. It made sense, right? That meant he needed to find a... room where servants had some sort of workplace or something... somewhere where their keys and... cleaning stuff maybe... was put into.

Stan looked at the other doors all around him.

Well, time to get searching then.

He found a room that looked like a study. Smaller, warmer. A now cold fireplace and a desk and a chair, bookcases and a small table and a clock. Nothing too special but some things about it were remarkable.

There were different tapestries here. While the others he found so far looked highly stylistic, depicting flowers and animals and geometric symbols, these were different. Eyes and triangles, fire and humanoid creatures, kneeling before a symbol of a looming triangle with an open eye.

Something resonated with Stan at the sight again, his vision became a little blurry and he could hear laughter, mocking and cruel. Suddenly, he felt like a cold hand was reaching for his heart and squeezing it, a terror that ripped through his entire being.

“ _The name is Bill Cipher. And it is so good to be back.”_

“ _One day, you will slip up. And until you do, I'll be watching you.”_

“ _I'll be watching you.”_

“ _I'll be watching you.”_

Stan pressed his hands to his ears, trying to block out the sound of the voice in his memories. He wanted to scream but he didn't have enough air, his lungs compressed by the ice-cold hands that held his heart.

This had to be what was at stake. This was what he had been hunting with his brother. This was the evil they were trying to purge from the world.

He had no idea who or what Bill Cipher was, but he had to be stopped.

The feeling of terror slowly ebbed off, the ice-cold hands released their grip on his heart, and Stan sucked in a few desperate breaths of air.

He was lying on the ground again, panting heavily, his head spinning but his thoughts were clearer than ever.

He was here to stop Bill Cipher and he would succeed or die trying.

He searched the room as soon as his shaking legs could carry him again. A room that could trigger such a powerful reaction from him HAD to have some clues. He found a few sheets of paper in the desk, some ripped out journal pages.

_He started talking about that Bill again. I mean, yeah, that stupid mansion is full of that Illuminati Doritos crap. Seems like the old owners were fans of that jerk._

_He thinks he is still around. I don't know why he thinks that, but I doubt it. He started gathering all sorts of junk in his room in the basement. Creeps me out to be honest._

_Mabel stays away from that, fortunately. But Dipper... I’m worried about him._

Stan looked at the written words before him. Apparently his brother knew more about this Bill. But Stan himself had been sceptical about him being still around...

And his brother had been doing something in the basement that had unsettled him.

He was still missing a lot of the pieces. But it seemed more and more as if he couldn't trust his brother to have the best of intentions. It sounded like his brother was trying to play with a power way beyond his understanding.

Dangerous. Foolish.

  
Stan needed this key, as fast as possible.

The next room was similar to the study except for one unsettling detail. When Stan lifted his lantern, he saw scrawled letters covering the walls. Red paint (blood?) all over the wallpaper. The words “He is watching us” “HE will return” “The beast with one eye” were repeated over and over and over, as well as “He promised us!” and symbols, triangles and eyes. It looked like the ravings of a madman.

He found a ripped out page too, although he wasn't sure if it had been from his journal.

It was a page with a drawing of a triangle with one eye, a small bow tie, arms and legs and a slim top hat. The words written in black ink talked about a muse and an inspiration, a friend. They were crossed out with red, red ink scribbled over everything.

“He betrayed me.”

Stan didn't take this page with him.

On the bookshelf, he found a leather bound book that had the same symbol of a triangle with an eye on its back. Stan picked it up in the vague hope to finally get some straight-forward information.

The book was more of a family chronicle, following the history of the former owners of this mansion. It was an old family, able to trace their ancestors back to some nobility in Europe. They fell on hard times at one point and were forced to sell almost everything and look for their fortune far away from home.

On their way to the west coast, they traveled through a forest. There, in a hidden cave, they found a stone slap depicting an entity that was said to grant a great boon for those in its service.

They summoned the entity, a being of dreams and visions that gave them power and wealth as long as they stayed close to these woods. So they settled there, using its influence to built up their fortune again, to built this house and live in service of their new benefactor who would send them visions and missions through dreams.

But it seemed that whatever the price was the being asked for, it was way too much. Family members that left the woods would be plagued by nightmares and hellish visions that drove them mad. Other family members were tasked with something they couldn't comprehend or understand and it ended up breaking them. Others were not themselves anymore - their eyes glowed golden and they were heard laughing while they flung themselves down the stairs or into the spikes of the iron fence surrounding the lands, still laughing maniacally as the life slowly drained from their broken bodies.

The last entries were written in a shaky hand, something about the demon not having returned to the mansion for a while and the last survivors of the family arguing about what to do, some wanting to stay now that it was safe and others wanting to use the ongoing silence to flee. The writer of the chronicle wrote that he, too, would leave as soon as possible.

  
Stan wondered if he had ever made it out of the house. But more than that, he wondered what had happened to those who had stayed. The house seemed to have been deserted for a long, long time.

In the next room, Stan found the key he needed.

Anxious but determined, he ventured back to the door to the basement as quickly as he could to finally open it. Cold air rushed against his face and as he stared down the stairs, it was like staring into the maw of a beast. He took one last deep breath and descended into the dark.

The basement was different from the house upstairs. Instead of wood, it was now stone that surrounded him. Instead of luxury, it was simple practicality. Instead of warm and dry, the air was cold and damp. In the distance, he could hear something dripping.

However, there were doors left and right of the corridors again, indicating that the basement was just as vast as the mansion upstairs.

Stan was more than thankful for his lantern.

He opened the first door, the one right across the basement door and the stairs he just came from. It revealed... a surprisingly nice looking room. There was a mattress on the floor and it looked like somebody had just recently slept here. There was a desk, some candles, a bookcase and a chair. It was surprisingly dry and warm in here, too. But that is where the “nice” part ended. Because as soon as Stan lifted his lantern, he was almost blinded by gold. Golden pyramids and golden paintings and eyes that stared at him. The room was filled with all sorts of things shaped in the image of Bill Cipher.

It send a shiver down Stan's back.

On the desk were lots of papers, scribbles Stan couldn't make out, but also a few pages that looked like they had been torn out from journals again.

_I have made a mistake. I know that nobody is perfect and that I, genius but still human, can as easily err as any other mortal being. But I try to take all the care in the world to ensure all of my decisions are well-thought out and based on logic instead of fickle feelings._

_I made a mistake, that is without question, but I am not entirely sure what it was._

_If I had to make a guess, it probably had to do with Stanley. My twin always manages to make me emotional, clouding my judgment. It wouldn't be surprising if that is the case this time too. My brother just has that effect on me._

_It had started simple. It always did._

_After Weirdmageddon, there still was some cleaning up to be done. Some weirdness here, some supernatural remnants there that needed to be taken care of before something dangerous could arise from them._

_Maybe my need and drive to do so were a result of the event. I admit I still have next to no memories of the incident after being turned to gold by Bill Cipher. One moment I was fighting my long-time nemesis and then I was a statue, not able to think or perceive anything. I was awoken by Bill from time to time, to face humiliation, pain and questions for the equation to allow Bill’s chaos to spread out over the whole world. And I endured all of it, for the good of the universe._

_And then things become... hazy. My brother and a rag-tag group of people and creatures stole my house to use it as a weapon and Dipper and his twin sister suddenly were there too, shouting and trying to accomplish something - putting up a fight, I assume? And then I was a statue again._

_When I woke up, Bill was gone and all of us were standing in the forest, surrounded by the rubble of Bill's Fearamid and the shards of my mission. My brother was there too, grinning like he used to when he had just won a boxing match, back when we were children. He was grinning like a loon, just like he had been as a young boy bragging with a shiny prize medal around his neck that in the end was of no consequence._

_ But there were consequences. Things to do to prevent the rift that left the veil between dimensions thin and brittle from causing more trouble and chaos. My brother wanted to celebrate. I wanted to keep the world save. _

_So I had to throw myself into the task of cleaning up. Whatever they did to banish Bill (they claimed they had destroyed Bill, but a being like him could not be destroyed just like that – I refuse to believe that), it had left a lot of patches of weirdness. I am determined to not leave any loose ends._

_So I went out and sealed leftover portals, hunted down ghosts and even banished one left-behind minion of Bill._

_  
And then I heard of the cursed mansion of the late Northwests._

_Maybe my mistake was the impulse of not wanting to be alone, as foolish as it sounds. I usually work alone, have done so my whole life, but after everything that had happened, I... might have wanted company and Dipper... well, I enjoy spending my time with such a bright boy. In many ways, he is a lot like me when I was his age._

_A drive to uncover knowledge, a mind greater than those around him and an unquenchable thirst for adventure. Dipper looks up to me for knowledge and guidance and I am happy (and a bit flattered) to give him that._

_Sometimes I admit I feel a flutter of jealousy, wishing that somebody would have supported me in a similar manner in my youth. Somebody who I could have talked to on the same intellectual level, who would have nurtured and sated my hunger for knowledge and more. Somebody who would have understood and truly believed in me and my abilities._

~~ _A flash of an almost forgotten memory sometimes comes unintentionally to me whenever I feel that jealousy, a wide smile with some teeth missing and the words "you are just too cool, bro" in my ear. Stanley has many faults, but at least when we were children, he had served well as support for me until his love became suffocating, being only regarded as a part of StanleyandFord instead of Ford, just me. Also, Stanley has never understood, not really, otherwise he would have supported me more, wouldn't have ruined my life and wouldn't have just taken, taken, taken everything from me until he finally took too much and left me to deal with the broken pieces of what was left._ ~~

_Why am I writing about this? It has been a long, long time ago and I am not that petty to be still hung up about the stupid mistakes of a selfish child. I am the bigger man after all, ruled by logic, not by emotions, so I try and make peace with my brother._

_Maybe that was the mistake. Because of my desire to teach and my willingness to let bygones be bygones, I invited Dipper on a trip to seal up some ancient weirdness I had detected in the old Northwest mansion. Of course, Dipper’s twin, Mabel, had to come with him. To be honest, I dread that Dipper one day will be in the same position as myself, being faced with the burden of being a brother when he could be so much more alone - but I still allowed it, heavens knows why._

_Stanley, grumbling something about a promise to keep the children safe, tagged along too._

_Maybe that was the final mistake, not saying no and instead letting the inevitable catastrophe take its course._

Wow, his brother was a pretentious prick. Holy cow. Stan frowned at the text. What a load of hogwash and honestly, what was his brother writing about Dipper and Mabel? Why was he disregarding Mabel that much?  
  


Also Stan couldn't imagine that he was like his brother described him in his little rant there. Now it was HIS fault his brother fucked up? But  _he_ had been betrayed! He did... something to get him back from somewhere and this prick didn't even mentioned it. According to this, it was clear he and the kids SAVED his brother's ungrateful ass and his thank you was that his brother was disregarding him like this?

Well fuck that guy. He would get a fist to the face delivered the instant Stan found him.

Stan huffed and shoved the page away, finding another snippet of paper beneath. He almost didn't read it, but then his eye caught the symbol of Bill Cipher again.

_I think I solved the code now. The cult of the All-seeing Eye seemed to have some sort of copy of the summoning stone, a different one from the one I am familiar with, however. A copy that not only anchors Bill to this world in case he gets banished, but also a way to bring him back should something happen to him._

_This is dangerous. I haven't figured out where the Sanctuary is just yet but it has to be in the basement, this basement. I have to find it, study it. Bill is still here and I have to do something about it._

_I hope I can keep him busy so he won't realize that I am working on the very thing to destroy him._

Fear gripped Stan's heart when he read these words. So this was the reason they were here. This was the end-all, be-all. To destroy whatever this cult had hidden to make the return of that dangerous demon possible.

Maybe he and his brother had found it. Maybe they had already tried to destroy it. But they, he, probably had failed at some point and Stan had lost his memory in the process, and now he had to do this task without any recollection of his previous failure.

While searching for more clues with new determination, he wondered why he had been the only one waking up upstairs to find a locked basement door.

Where were his brother and the children? What had happened? What had they done? What had Stan done?

Scattered on the floor, he collected more ripped-out pages from a journal, and was relieved to see that they looked like his own writing again.

_My brother is...he's not a bad person but he gets absorbed in his work and tends to forget that the kids are kids and not his assistants, and that need food and sleep and stuff. So yeah, somebody has to remind him that we're all still humans._

_Seriously, these last years really did a number on him. He's never been... a warm person. But some of these days I wonder how much of my brother really is left in him. Or how much of my brother has ever been there in the first place._

Stan snorted a bit. Apparently he was beginning to wise up that his brother was a jerk. Good. Ugh, was this the new point of view he had gained through amnesia that made him see this clearly? After this was over, Stan would take the children and leave. Maybe that was for the best.

There were more entries that sounded different, less bitter, but worried.

_Dipper started showering. That... is actually strange. That boy hasn't even changed his clothes the whole summer. And now basically lives in the shower. He seems... awfully jumpy too. Can't shake the feeling it has something to do with my brother. … what kind of trouble did he stir up now?_

Stan's heart was racing again. This was... worrying. Something bad had happened. He could feel it.

What had his brother done?

… also why did his brother have some of his pages from his journal lying in his room? Had he stolen them? Before or after Stan had lost his memories?

More and more, Stan began to fear his brother, what he was capable of. His stomach turned as he left the room behind, willing himself to go forward to search the rest of the basement.

It was even darker down there. The walls seemed to close in on him the further he ventured from room to room. He found more pictures of the demon, golden pyramids and other precious material made into the image of this Bill Cipher. The fear came back to Stan, his heart beating faster and uncomfortably loud in the all-encompassing silence.

He found hidden doors and hidden passageway, leading him deeper and deeper and making his guess that this cursed mansion was just as vast underground as it was above all the more accurate.

Sometimes he believed he heard whispering in the dark corridor ahead, saw shadows in the corner of his eyes. No doubt the demon recognized him as a danger and was trying to keep him from progressing. In a way, it was comforting to Stan, as it had to mean that he was on the right path. He just had to press on.

He sometimes also heard echoes of the past, saw flashes of visions. Memories, he assumed, triggered by the places he walked by.

_"Dipper, why are you out and about at night?"_

_"I... I dunno. I think I heard something."_

_"You heard something?"_

_"A noise. Uh... it sounded scary. Mabel said she didn't hear anything, but I was so sure..."_

A flash of white and gold and red and blue.

“ _Great uncle Ford, Great uncle Ford! Look, my detector is freaking out! There must be an extremely dangerous ghost around here!”_

“ _Ahaha, Dipper. The really high-level ones don't show themselves that easily. In fact, the ones beyond level 10 will mask their presence. You wouldn't know a paranormal entity like that was close by until you wake up with mystery bruises or with pieces of yourself missing...”_

“ _I don't want to have any parts of the kids missing.”_

“ _Oh Stanley, lighten up. I will be right here, and nothing will happen.”_

Stan sometimes had trouble piecing these snippets together correctly. Often, it was just remnants of conversations ripped out of context and it was hard to know if the words had been his own or if he had only overheard them.

“ _Dipper? What are you doing here at this time of the night?”_

“ _... Can I spend the night here? Something... Is not right. I'm getting dizzy and I think I blacked out earlier... can you check if there are any ghosts around?”_

“ _Of course. Just... lie down I will watch over you.”_

Stan found another room, deeper in the basement. It looked like somebody had slept here, too. There was next to no furniture here, just bare stone, but there were pages of journals and books strewn around all over the floor.

  
Stan felt uneasy in this room. It was as if the stonewalls were closing in, as he bend down to pick up one of the pages. The hand-writing seemed unfamiliar.

_Something strange is happening. My body hurts. There are bruises I don't remember getting. I feel... I feel weird. I thought going to my great uncle would solve the problem but... I feel it got worse._

_I'm afraid. A bit. Also I have these dreams... I can't remember them well, but they make me feel all sick and strange and icky. I can't even tell Mabel about them. I just hope we can leave soon._

A heavy and hot feeling settled in Stan's guts that he couldn't name when he read the lines written in the still slightly scrawly, sprawling letters of a child. Memories were stirring at the words.

“ _Great uncle Ford... I am scared...”_

“ _You must not be afraid, Dipper. I know a solution. I can draw a protection circle for you. So that this rough ghost won't be able to get you.”_

Was the name of his brother Ford? Stan couldn't tell, but he shivered when he listened to the ghost of his memories. Had he already suspected that something was up and had been spying on his brother?

Also Dipper had been in distress, Dipper had been afraid. Why hadn't his brother removed him from the mansion, but had resorted to something obviously stupid like a protection circle?

“ _Great uncle Ford, it happened again!”_

“ _... what a troublesome ghost. We might have to go about this differently.”_

“ _... thank you.”_

“ _Of course, Dipper. I'll take care of this.”_

Stan shook his head. His brother had obviously failed. Something had hurt Dipper and he had failed to protect him. What had he been doing? His hands were shaking, when he discovered another entry written by Dipper.

_Things are happening, Mabel is worried about me, but I think I am fine? … no, I'm not, I know that but... but I can't. Whatever is happening I can't tell Mabel._

_I woke up with cuts and bruises again, they freak me out. Also I am sore at... other places and I don't know how or why. It hurts but I don't want to tell anybody, it's just... I can't._

Dread seized Stan and he was overcome by a terrible feeling, but he couldn't even bring himself to voice his thoughts in his own head. He took the pages and searched the rest of the room.

To his relief, he found more hints and pieces of the puzzle of the mansion between the scattered sheets of paper. Stan left the room with an updated map of the mansion, some strange knickknacks and an even heavier heart than before.

But it got worse.

Stan wandered the labyrinth of this underground dungeon for hours, haunted by bits and pieces of visions and echoes, and by the shadows that seemed to chase him or run away from his light.

Was he losing his mind? Or was this just another trick of that demon?

_"What are you doing? You hide away all day and night in that dark creepy place... and now Dipper has nightmares and is acting strangely."_

“ _The mansion belonged to worshipers of Bill Cipher. I can imagine that the boy is uneasy to be around all of this.”_

“ _We should have never brought the kids then.”_

“ _Don't be daft. I am working together with him. He just needs some time to calm down and he'll be right as rain.”_

While he tried to solve the puzzles to get to the place where Bill could be brought back to this world, Stan tried to piece together what he had learned.

He had come here with his brother to seal an ancient evil. The kids that had accompanied them meant the world to him. His brother and his nephew, Dipper, were close. Dipper had started to feel strange, showing signs of something hurting him. He had spent the nights with his brother, starting to act stranger and stranger.

Something had harmed him. His brother was not to be trusted.

What if he had worshiped Bill like the others? What if his brother had blinded them all, had lead them to this place to offer them as sacrifices?

There was this feeling of something not quite falling into place - and Stan also didn't want to believe that his own flesh and blood would betray him like that.

But still, it was time to face the facts.

He was overcome by an overwhelming flash of memories when he came to another room. There was dried blood on the ground. Only a few old and dried splashes, but it still hit Stan like a punch in the stomach.

_The feeling of soft skin under his hands as he tried to crush... something between his hands, but hesitated._

_Laughter in his eyes._

“ _You... will only damage.... the body.” Pressed, wheezing words, yet oddly gleeful. “Doesn't... matter. Actually it’s… hilarious.”_

_Laughter and golden eyes and he felt rage and shame and something even darker and more feral, something in his stomach and groin, something he hadn't felt in so long. He felt himself slipping, shifting, crying out. There was a slick sound and something else he could not name, would not name._

_A cry with two voices answered him and the rest was darkness and laughter._

He resurfaced from the memory feeling sick and shaky.

This didn't make any sense. No sense at all.

Why did he have this memory? It was his brother Ford who had written about... He never... this couldn't be his memory. Stan told himself it was just a nightmare or a vision sent by Bill to mock him, but deep down he knew he was wrong.

“ _Well, well, well, well, well well well well well... If this isn't Sixer, my favorite.”_

“ _Bill?”_

“ _Like my new puppet?”_

“ _Hey, don't damage the merchandise!”_

“ _Pain is hilarious!”_

“ _What is it, Fordsy? Come here and get me.”_

“ _No matter what, you'll slip up and when you do... well... I'm watching you. I am always watching you.”_

“ _Come on, Fordsy. You want it, right?”_

In the end, denial could not be upheld forever. He had made a mistake. Something was not right. Something was wrong, wrong, wrong but he couldn't think about it, it couldn't be true. His brain offered the solution that was the most logical, but he just couldn't--

It couldn't be true.

In the last room, the sanctuary, lay a rock, smashed to pieces. Bill's eye was staring at him mockingly from the destroyed carvings.

His brother was there too, as were the kids. But they didn't seem relieved to see him. Mabel wasn't looking at him. His brother was staring at him with an expression that was cold and hard like iron on icy winter days. Dipper looked at him with anger and disgust. There was a broken machine that resembled a gun in his hands. And a lost memory rushed back, clicking neatly into place inside his brain.

“ _YOU KNEW WHAT WAS GOING ON!”, Dipper screamed at Ford, eyes wide and red and shiny and Ford could only feel his heart beating fast and his thoughts rushing with a steady no no no._

“ _Dipper... I”, he started but Dipper didn't let him gather his thoughts, stepping into his personal space (too close too soon) and continued with his tirade._

“ _NO!” Dipper screamed, punctuating his words by stabbing his index finger at Ford's chest. “No! You... I remember finding these... bruises and feeling all wrong and hurting! I remembered some stuff and I thought... I actually thought I had the most fucked up dreams ever! I thought I was disgusting and wrong and I was so creeped out by myself! I thought I was going insane! I thought I was crazy and gross and I was thinking I was doing YOU wrong by even dreaming about this! And it was true? It was not only true but... But BILL TOOK OVER MY BODY and you KNEW it and you never told me? You didn't tell me anything! I was so freaked out and you not only didn't tell me that Bill was using my body but you also... You just... you just DID that? With my body? Why the FUCK did you think that was okay?”_

“ _Dipper, look... I--”_

“ _NO! No, this is bullshit! YOU are full of BULLSHIT!” Dipper screamed at him, now with actually tears in his eyes and Ford felt like his heart was being ripped out of his chest. He was losing his nephew, his family, the only human that could understand..._

“ _But..”_

_  
_ _ “NO!”, Dipper continued. “Did you ever actually give a DAMN about me? Or was it just about Bill from the start?” _

“ _I...”_

“ _You never did, huh?” Dipper asked, his voice sounding more mellow, sobs mixing into his words. “You never actually cared about me. It's like Stan always said. All that you are interested in is your research and yourself and Bill. You'd have traded me in an instant for a chance to get Bill back for yourself. You would have and... and you DID. You didn't help me, you didn't stop him, you even went along with it and I bet you had plans to prolong it. This fucked up thing you have with the fucking dream demon and the power you think you have over him when he is actually playing with YOU was more important to you that anything. All this here... it was more important than Grunkle Stan, than your family, than Fiddleford or... or me. Because you are a selfish jerk that only thinks about himself and I was a fool to think like you and think that I was special enough for you.”_

“ _No! Dipper, you don't understand...”, Ford tried to explain. “I... I just...”_

“ _You just what?”, Dipper hissed. “You HURT me. You did something to me that... that can never be made better!”_

“ _Dipper, it was just... just your body, I thought...”_

“ _JUST MY BODY?” Dipper screamed. “I LIVE IN IT! Sure, maybe I was not aware when you did it but I woke up with bruises and pain and no idea what happened. Not remembering how I got them DOESN'T MAKE IT BETTER!”_

“ _But...”_

“ _No.” Dipper hissed. “I hate you.”, he whispered. “I HATE you!”, he screamed. “I HATE YOU and what you did to me and that you tried to hide it and didn't try to stop.”_

“ _I... I thought it was the best way...”_

“ _No.” Dipper said. “You didn't think about what was best for me or anybody else other than you, Ford. You didn't try to help me. You didn't try to stop Bill. You weren't there to take care of me, you didn't even look at me! Instead, you encouraged me to think I got the injuries while sleepwalking, you tried to explain the stuff away and I trusted you. I even went so far that I tried to stay close to you, because I thought you would keep whatever was hurting me away from me. But you didn't. You told me a ghost was probably messing with me! You told me that you watched over me all night and nothing unusual happened! And I believed you! And you used me and knew it was wrong, but did it anyway because you wanted to do it and deluded yourself into thinking it was right.”_

_Ford couldn't say any more, his mind reeling. He had to fix this, he had to fix this, he had to make Dipper UNDERSTAND, but there was no time because there was Stan and he looked murderous and there was something gleaming in his fist and no no no no they didn't understand!_

“ _STANFORD PINES”, Stan roared as he came closer with a surprising speed. “YOU ABSOLUTE BASTARD!”_

_The next Ford knew was that he got a knuckleduster in his face and his mind was still reeling. This was all wrong, this was not how it was supposed to go. They should have never found out, Bill had claimed that Dipper was sleeping and he himself had made sure there was nothing amiss. His brother couldn't have figured it out on his own – had Bill told him? Was this one of Bill's tricks meant to mess with him? Was this even real? It couldn't be real, but – the pain was. Still, he did the motions of trying to wake up or gain lucidity in the “dream” but nothing worked. It had to be real, but how could it be?_

_Everybody was shouting now, Stan and Dipper and Mabel too (why was Mabel here?) and it was wrong, wrong, wrong, they didn't understand that he had to keep Bill around and busy, that Bill was dangerous and that he was doing all of this for the greater good! Dipper surely WOULD understand if he just LISTENED! He presumed that Stan and Mabel couldn't understand, they had no eyes for the bigger picture, but Dipper! He had read the journal, he had understood what they were up against. He had told Dipper about the rift and Weirdmageddon and about the finer details concerning Bill. He was so sure that Dipper would understand. Why DIDN'T he understand?_

_He just needed some time to THINK, but everybody was so LOUD._

_He needed time, he needed to go back, he had to fix this, fix this, fix this..._

_His eyes landed on the memory gun. There were no clear thoughts in his head, just flashes of ideas._

_They shouldn't have found out, he had to fix this. He had to fix this, he had to fix this._

“ _I have to fix this.”, Ford whispered as he took the gun and fired, not caring of what happened next. There was a blinding white flash of light and then there was nothing._

He had made a mistake.

Stan looked into his brother's eyes and knew he himself was not Stan. Stan, yet not Stan at all. He had made a mistake.

“ _Hello, Sixer!”_

Six fingers on his hand. Five on the hand of his brother.

“ _Well, well, well, well, well well well... if this isn't Sixer here to save the day.”_

The name Stan didn't sound right. It wasn't his. It was close, it was SO CLOSE, but not RIGHT.

_A STUBBORN TOUGH NEW JERSEY NATIVE FILBRICK WASN’T TOO CREATIVE HAVING TWINS WAS NOT HIS PLAN SO HE JUST SHRUGGED AND NAMED BOTH STAN._

He was not Stan. He was... He was...

“Stanford.”, his twin said tensely and there was something cold, hard, sharp that seemed to cut through him.

The cold hand was back, gripping his heart.

He made a mistake, he made a terrible mistake.

His brother's name was Stanley. His own name was Stanford. He had it all wrong.

His brother loved the children. His brother had worked tirelessly to get him back (his brother was the one that had doomed him before!) He had betrayed his brother (his brother had betrayed him).

Stanford was not to be trusted. Stanford was the one that had done some terrible things. These memories were no nightmares, no visions, they were horribly, terribly true.

He had done it. It had been his hands, it had been his thoughts, it was his mind. All of him.

He had made a mistake.

There was no fixing it.

Everything slid back into place. The fight in the inner hall, the revealing of his secrets, the betrayal in Dipper's eyes and the roar of Stanley and the empty look in Mabel's eyes as if he was a stranger.

Also the memories before that. Their arrival at the mansion. His discovery that a contract was still binding Bill to this world. Dipper. Bill possessing Dipper and him dancing a dangerous dance with the demon.

The discovery of the sanctuary, the need to keep Bill occupied until he could study the spell.

The dark, dark feeling of arousal when his hands had been wrapped around Dipper's throat and when he could hear Bill gasp in pain. The rush of power he had felt as the demon was at his mercy. Bill being helpless, Bill being beneath him, powerless to stop him and at the same time grinning at him, not bothering to struggle at all. Interested enough to come back again and again instead of following his own plans.

He had been so sure that Dipper would understand. That this was a sacrifice for something greater, more. He himself would have agreed in a heartbeat, and Dipper was so much like him, surely they would think alike on the matter? And because he had been so sure, he had decided to spare Dipper of even having to make that decision. He had been so sure this was the right thing to do, just to keep Bill distracted, until he knew how to banish him or destroy him for good.

But something had gone wrong. They had found out, Dipper hadn't understood and Stanley had been about to destroy the stone with the spell that could summon Bill and Ford couldn't let him do that, what if they needed it?

He still needed to study it, he still needed time, much more time.

He had used the memory gun to erase all their memories. He had tried to make things RIGHT again. It hadn't worked.

He had been wrong, so wrong. It had been all him, only him. Stanley hadn't trusted him at all.

“Wh...what happened?”

“Bill is gone.” Stan said, growling. “The job is done, we are going home.”

He left with the children and Ford followed them. He hastily collected the shards of the stone slab, called out for them to wait as he hurried after them, tried to talk to them, to ask them if they remembered what he had done and why and how, to make them understand again, but Stanley took the children with him fast and Ford could only follow after them in silence.

“ _Oh Fordsy. You'll never learn, will you?”_

Hours later, Ford was in the room he had inhabited during his stay, the one in the basement, across the door that led upstairs. It was surely morning already, but he felt more left in the dark than ever before. He couldn't bear to look at the mattress (were there stains? He couldn't remember, maybe he had turned it over at some point and now he felt to sick to look closely) in the corner of the room but he did examine the fragments of the summoning stone he had collected and brought here.

Was there no way to fix it?

The door opened and tore Ford away from his musings. Stan stepped into the darkened room, expression carefully neutral. Ford didn't like that at all.

Stan stepped beside Ford and for a while there was silence while they both looked at the broken stone.

“What are you doing here, Ford?” Stan asked finally.

“... I am not sure if he is truly gone.” Ford said slowly. “The stone tablet could have been full of hints how to prevent him to come back.”

“It's broken now.”

“... you were always good at breaking things.” Ford said, voice getting more bitter than he intended and Stan beside him snorted.

“Sure I am. I also broke the fucking demon.”

“How...?”

“You know what the solution was?”, Stan asked with only a glance at Ford as he threw the memory gun on the table next to the broken stone. It was broken but most of the parts were still there. There was also a word on the display. _Bill Cipher._ “That dorito was still in Dipper, just not remembering everything. We figured it out, fetched the memory gun, got the darn thing to work again and shot Dipper with it before Bill could get out of his head. I went with Mabel into his mind afterwards. The stupid triangle is gone now. We broke the stone after that to make sure he can't return.”

“You...”

“Bill is gone.” said Stan, voice hard and glaring at Ford. “And it was easy. You know, you could have done it at any point in time. If this idiot could figure it out...”, he said, knocking against his head just to drive the point home. “Why didn't you, the genius, have the idea to delete the dream demon with a frigging memory gun?”

“I...”, Ford didn't know what to say, because there was no way. Bill couldn't be gone that easily. He had been battling Bill for 30 years and had known him even longer. It couldn't be. “No, he is still out there! He's tricky, he can...”

“No, he can't.” said Stan coldly. “We checked. He's gone. For god's sake Ford, when you talk about him, you make him out to be this... giant mastermind of a demon who can do anything.”

“Because he is!”

“No, Ford.” Stan shook his head. “He was a con artist and he had you wrapped around his little fingers. He could show you pretty pictures and mess with your dreams, but what else? He can only take over a body if he made a deal with that somebody. He can't do much without a body besides annoying the heck out of you. He makes mistakes, he doesn't know everything... for Christ's sake, the kids were able to kick him out of my mind all by themselves. While being in the mindcrape...”

“Mindscape.”, Ford corrected him without thinking.

“... whatever.” Stan said, glaring. “Anyway, they were on his home turf and he still got the crap kicked out of him. He didn't even get what he wanted from me. The only reason he was so dangerous to you was because you made yourself vulnerable to him. And even that problem you solved neatly.”, he punctuated that by knocking his knuckles against Ford's forehead where the metal plate still was. “You just WANTED him to be all powerful and dangerous.”

“I didn't! Don't you know what I have been through because of him? What I had to do? What sacrifices I have made?”

Stan snorted before turning his head a bit as if he was looking at something far away. “Do you remember when we were kids? You used to be afraid of the monster under the bed.”

“... what does that have to do with anything?” Ford asked, miffed by the sudden change of topic.

“You used to be so afraid of something getting you from under the bed. That's why you always slept in the top bunk.” Stan continued. “And when you couldn't sleep, I used to tell you stories. I told you stories of Ford Pineston, the brave knight that battled all sorts of monster. I told you stories of Hal Forester, who braved the jungle and discovered all sorts of hidden mysteries. I told you stories of Steel Oak, who was a monster hunter and always got the catch of the day by being daring and dashing.”

“What are you going on about?” huffed Ford.

“... you had cast yourself into the role of the hero of your own little bedtime story in your head.” Stan accused him. “In your head, you are STANFORD PINES, the scientist turned badass space pirate, who battles the big and powerful dream demon. And you made him that powerful in your mind because the more powerful Bill was, the more powerful and awesome you are when you overcome him or even when he names you his nemesis. Because, you know, you have to be extremely powerful if a powerful being deems you dangerous, right?”

  
“I...”

“But it was all in your head and he played you from the start. First the muse bullshit, then he played the all-seeing all-mighty dream demon. Yeah, he's powerful, but not as much as you made him out to be. But you were to busy stroking your ego and your own obsession with him and yourself that you didn't noticed just what a sad sack of a con artist he was. And while you tried to build him up into something that could stroke your ego even more, you hurt everybody around you.”

Stan's voice got lower and more growling. “You hurting me? Well, that sucked, but I was kinda used to it. You hurting me is nothing new. But I told you not to hurt the kids. And what did you do?”

“I didn't...”

“WHAT DID YOU DO?”

“I... I just tried to...”

Stan spun around and pinned Ford against the wall with a surprising amount of force. “WHAT. DID. YOU. DO?”

“I... I hurt... them?” Ford stuttered, surprised and horrified that he felt a very vivid fear of his twin twisting in his stomach.

“Right.” Stan growled before letting Ford go, turning around and getting a kind of nostalgic look on his face again. “... remember when I came to you in the middle of the winter when you wrote me that card? We hadn't talked for 10 years. You had seen me being thrown out on the streets as a teenager without money or even a high school degree for a stupid mistake I had made and you hadn't done anything. And all I got after 10 years was a postcard saying “Come to Gravity Falls”. And I did. Because I still loved you and I thought you would still love me. And when I came, all I got was a crossbow in my face.”

Ford did have the decency to feel a bit guilty about it, but... but, well, there had been a lot going on with Bill and the portal and he hadn't slept for days so... cut him some slack!

“I... remember.” Ford conceded.

“Good.” Stan said before his voice dropped again. “If I ever see your face again, a crossbow will be the smallest of your problems. I've got a shotgun ready right at my door and several other guns around the house. You are dead to me now, Stanford, and if you ever set a foot into my line of sight, I'll make sure you're dead to the rest of the world, too.”

“St..stanley?” Ford asked, shocked not only but Stan's words but also by the shaking in his voice and the trembling of his heart. His brother would never... His brother loved him. Unconditionally! Ford had counted on him being angry and bitter at Ford, on him shouting and hitting him and giving him a talk about the value of family or something.

He had never expected Stan to... to cut him out. He had come after ten years of nothing when Ford had needed him, he had spend 30 years on the portal to get him back and Ford had been so sure that Stan would always help him no matter what circumstances...

He was wrong. He couldn't be wrong? Where was the mistake?

He was still staring as Stan turned to walk to the stairs leading upstairs.

“W...wait! Stanley!” Ford called, walking after him. “The house is still mine! I...”

“Oh cut the crap Stanford.” Stan hissed. “I lived in the darn thing longer than you ever did. I paid the bills and all that crap. I rebuilt that thing a few times when it got damaged. I got the deed. I created the Mystery Shack. It was the first successful and worthwhile thing I've ever done, and I did it completely without you. It's mine.”

“You can't...” Ford protested, but the look on Stan's face made him freeze in his step. Stan had already reached the top of the stairs and had opened the door leading to the first floor. There was light shining down into the room, probably coming from the windows. It was morning after all. The beams of sunlight reflected on the countless Bill memorials scattered across the room.

And the way Stan was turned towards him, looking down, illuminated by the light of the new day, he looked... regal. Like a king that had made his judgment and it was not in Ford's favor. His whole body seemed to glow and the knuckleduster on his left hand was shining with an oddly golden gleam too.

“I can.” Stan said. “And I should have a long time ago. Heh, but look at it like this, pal: The thing most important to you has always been your strange spookums and this stupid dream demon. Now you can worship that creep all you want till the end of times.”

  
And with these words he went through the door, slamming it shut behind him and gone was the light and the shining gleam, leaving Ford alone in the dark, surrounded by hundreds of mocking eyes, and he could almost hear Bill laugh at him.

He had made a mistake. There was no fixing it.

**Author's Note:**

> Welp that is it. 
> 
> Let's be serious: Ford always was a very good Amnesia protagonist.


End file.
